When I Can Leave
by Schrodingers-Cat-Paradox
Summary: It's the one question - the only question. When can he leave, because John Watson is dead.


**Summary**: A single, exploding second destroyed nearly everything Sherlock Holmes ever though he knew. When can he leave, is the biggest question in his comatose induced mind. When can he leave, because John Watson is dead.

**Author's Note:** This is sort of kind of not really a spin off story to my other story "When I May Cease To Be." It in no way has to be read alongside that one, but I was just rereading reviews on that story and someone wondered how Sherlock would react if John lost his memory...well, that idea warped into whatever this is.

**Warnings: **Character death, Slash, drug abuse, blood, mild swearing...annnnd angst. gotta have the angst.

* * *

_when I can leave_

There is nothing in me that tells me what has happened. I feel empty and cold – more so than usual.

And no one is there.

I have to force my eyes to open, and when they do, I find myself on my back, staring up at the dark, star dotted sky. Red and blue lights occasionally filter into my vision, and I can hear voices.

There's a weird feeling in my chest and stomach as I sit up. As though I've left the both of them behind. It hurts to try and stand, so I roll over to settle on all fours, my hands pressed into the snow. Oddly I do not feel the cold.

I am not alarmed by the body that is before me. It is clearly mine, only it is in a state much worse. Bloody gashes all across the forehead, twisted limbs that suggest they're broken, and dark hair wet and matted from the snow.

I must be dead.

But that doesn't make much sense. I squint a little, making out the most miniscule movement of the man's – my – chest. Sherlock Holmes is very much alive.

Then that begs the question: what am I doing here? Out of body, but not out of mind, clearly. So clearly aware of my surroundings but unable to feel any of the injuries that have been inflicted upon my body. Looking down, I notice there are no wounds or wet clothing or even a bit of pain and cold.

I force myself to stand, my knees a bit shaky, and examine the area. Nothing makes sense, because I can't remember very well what happened just moments before. There are police cars and ambulances lined up on the snowy road just atop the ditch I'm standing in. A few feet into the ditch is a black car on its side, with a man talking to police next to it.

_Speeding driver – late for – _I shake my head to stop the deduction, needing to focus on what is happening right now. I can tell, however, that the man looks petrified and upset – and with barely a scratch on his left cheek.

My eyes move down the ditch to where a destroyed car now sits, completely turned over and dented – and I figure it had to have rolled down the ditch a few times following the impact. I cannot see the driver of the car, due to the darkness and cracked windows, so I move closer to the small cab, peering in through the windows.

The driver of the cab, is clearly no longer alive. His neck is broken and his face is mangled from the glass that shattered into it.

I look back at the emergency medical team and police officials. A few of them have moved to bend over me – or where my body lies – checking for a pulse and for the severity of the wounds.

"_Ejected from the vehicle, it so seems. May have just saved his life,"_ I hear one of them say.

"_If only the others had been so lucky."_

The others. At once my chest constricts as I remember someone – how could I have forgotten? – who had been in the car. Right beside me.

John.

With frozen limbs I move to look into the back of the car. And my heart seems to stop, only for a moment, and I stagger a little.

I have never felt a more powerful, horrible sadness than when I saw John Watson in the back of that cab. His body is twisted awkwardly, his head on the seat in front of him. His nose and mouth are bleeding severely, and his eyes are still open in what is probably shock. The seat belt he still wears is cutting into his neck and shoulder, and his legs have been crushed by the indenting door.

And his neck, like the cabbie's, is awkwardly twisted. And obviously broken. The window behind him is shattered, and shards of glass still rest on his dusty blonde hair and shoulders.

I have dealt with bodies for years. Bodies that have been so much more mangled than this. But the sight of John's body makes my stomach twist into an uncomfortable knot.

"_John," _I try to say, but nothing comes out. My vocal chords are back in my own body. I cannot speak.

And even if I could, John can no longer hear me.

I know he's dead. I know the bleeding and the fractured neck – and probably spine – leave little room for the contrary. But it hurts so much, to know. Especially since my own body lies just feet from this place. The place that John Watson died.

My vision is blurring as I continue to stagger backwards, until my feet are simply too shaky to hold me. I crash to the snowy ground, black flooding my vision, and my whole body shaking from the attempt to silently sob.

~0~

_It had been John who said "I love you" first._

_I may have felt it before then, but would never say it. Love was not in my vocabulary. Loving was dangerous. Love was a fool's foil. I had seen people die from love, or lack thereof, and felt determined to never feel it and become prey as they all did._

_And it had been almost an accident. Nothing romantic had ever happened between us until that rainy day in 221B. We were strictly platonic, just friends who went on wild adventures together and then came home to the same place each night. I had barely seen him shirtless, for God's sake._

_Rainy days were usually boring. No cases, no going out. Just a solitary, quiet flat with rain pelting the windows. However, watching the rain was sort of soothing – in a ridiculous way. And each time it did rain, I took out my violin and began to play. _

_This day was no different. But John, for once, seemed to notice._

"_That's an interesting piece, Sherlock," he said, a bit awkwardly._

_I didn't take my eyes off the rain dancing down the window, nor did I stop playing._

"_Are you composing again?"_

"_It helps me think," I said automatically, inherently. The drops on the window became round music notes, and I easily strung them together into songs._

"_It's….It's a nice piece." I heard John shift in his chair, but still I did not stop. "You're….you're….you're nice."_

_I ignored him, figuring he was just babbling off compliments like he always did._

"_I….I think – no, I – I love you."_

_I stopped my playing mid-note, blinking at the rain soaked window. I didn't turn around to face him, and at first assumed he had misspoken._

"_You do?" I asked him nonchalantly, trying to make my bow move across the violin's strings, but nothing happened._

"_I-I don't know….maybe….it just….you are….." But each attempt John made at a sentence failed._

"_I thought you were straight," I pointed out again, trying to ignore my shaking fingertips._

"_You….you can be straight and love someone of the same gender, Sherlock. It's called friendship."_

"_So that's what you were implying?" I knew it wasn't. I wanted it to be, but I knew it wasn't._

"_That's…..Sherlock, friend or otherwise, isn't it fair of me to say 'I love you?'"_

"_I don't typically hear men tell other men they love each other. And besides, you can't love me."_

_John didn't speak for a moment, and when he did, his voice was quiet, "Why can't I?"_

"_You 'love' your sister, John. You 'love' your parents. You even care a little for Lestrade. But you cannot love me. No one ever has."_

_Another short silence. Then – "Then don't you think you deserve it?"_

~0~

The doctors don't have to tell me what I already know. But I can hear them saying it anyway. In the darkness I can hear their voices, whispering and mumbling.

I don't need them for what I already know.

Comatose state. Barely able to breathe properly without a machine. Many surgeries to prepare for.

_John is dead._

The last part literally shakes me, and when I open my eyes, I find that I can once again move without my body following. I glance up at the ceiling, and over at the heart rate monitor and IV's and tubes that are all connected to me. I nearly fall off of the small hospital bed, looking down at my own body. I'm lying there, eyes closed, bandages wound around nearly every open skin area, and casts on both of my legs.

For a moment I wonder if this is possible. I rack my brain for anything to the opposite, but can find nothing. There is nothing that explains what is going on here. There is nothing that explains why my mind is working without my body, and I am able to stand over my own, dying body, completely fine.

I don't want to be here, looking at myself as I die. So instead I head for the door, slowly opening it. I do not even have to leave the room before I hear voices again.

"_What do you mean he's dead?"_ The shrill voice so clearly belongs to Harriet Watson. I make a quick deduction that John's mum and dad are probably with her.

"When the car rolled, he was crushed with the impact," another voice says, comfortingly. Probably a police officer or someone who was there on the scene. "When we got to the car, he was already gone."

"He _can't _be dead!" Harry screams, slightly maniacally. "He survived a _war _for God's sake! And….and he was killed by a _speeding driver?"_

"I know it can't be easy, but –"

"And what about that man you said was with him? Sherlock. He dead too?" The interrupting voice is much gruffer, deeper, and I assume it's John's father.

"Sherlock is in a very upsetting stage right now. He's….He's sort of a vegetable right now. He's still alive, but only just."

I glance back into the room at my body, undisturbed by the fact those machines are all I have keeping me alive.

"Are we allowed to see him?" John's father asks again.

"No, only family are allowed in at this point….it's been three days and no one has come by yet, I'm afraid."

I snort, the sound not coming out. I am not surprised no one has been by to see him yet. I would be more shocked if someone _had_ been by.

There's a short pause, and when the voices continue again, it's a softer, gentler female voice. A voice that is also shaky and riddled with sadness.

"We're like his family, in a way," she says. "He….he did take care of him…."

_He didn't need taking care of, _I want to say, to in some way show them that John was never one who needed to be cared for. But the words wouldn't come out if I wanted them too.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Watson….we just can't allow that," the voice of the official is back again, grief in her voice. I can tell she'd let them back if she weren't afraid of being in trouble for it. "Not yet…."

I don't want to listen anymore – or maybe I can't. I slowly back into the room, closing the door behind me, and turn once again to face my body.

_You could just die, you know. You have nothing else to live for._ _You wanted to be immortal, but you aren't. And this proves it. And John is dead. Your family won't care. No one would mind._

And as if in response to my thoughts, the heart rate monitor next to the bed slows, and my body jerks a bit.

_No one can love you._

The heart monitor slows dangerously, but it never stops. Because before it does, the doctors and nurses are charging in to resuscitate.

I watch, and, deep, deep inside me, hope they fail.

~0~

_My parents never pretended that they were proud of me. They never pretended that they had wanted me. They may have loved me, but that was always a lie. The only son they truly ever wanted was Mycroft._

_Everything Mycroft did when we both were young was always far better than what I did._

_Fourteen is the age that I decided Mycroft would always take my parents shining praise._

_It was also the age I decided they did not love me._

_And I did not love them._

_~0~_

I realize quite quickly that dying is boring.

For days I am forced to sit on the floor, back up against the wall, watching myself die. And every time I attempt to convince myself to give up, and the machines keeping me alive start to fail, somehow, _some way_, I am brought back.

You would think the doctors would know when a man just wants to go.

No one visits in this time. I am not expecting otherwise. I don't want my parents to come. I haven't spoken to them since going to university. They have made no efforts to contact me. And even if they did, I would ignore it.

I don't want Mycroft to come, either. He is one of the last people I want to see walking through that door, to look down at my body.

When I'm honest with myself, I don't want _anyone _to come through that door.

Well. I nearly don't want _anyone _to come through that door. There is only one man I would accept in this room right now. And he is dead.

At the thought of John my body starts twitching again, the heart rate monitor speeding up. I've finally figured out that the ghost that I am and my actual body are connected only by our minds. I am aware of everything that he is not, but he still can feel everything I know.

I close my eyes, my head falling against the wall without a sound. For the first time I can feel some of the pain I left to my own body. The constant pain in my legs, arms, and chest. The burn of the gashes along my face.

I almost welcome the pain, as a sign that maybe, _maybe, _this means I will finally be allowed to leave.

But just as I am thinking so, the slow, almost inaudible sound of the door being opened causes my eyes to jolt open and all the pain to subside.

_Why won't they just leave me –_

But my thoughts cut short. Because I recognize the man that is following the nurse into the room. And it is the very last man I ever wanted to see.

Mycroft.

"We were beginning to worry none of his family would show," the nurse is saying, but I can barely notice her now. My focus is solely on Mycroft, wondering what in the _bloody hell _he is doing here.

"Don't expect anyone else to," Mycroft says flatly, his gaze lingering for a moment on the many tubes and machines hooked up to my body.

The nurse looks slightly uncomfortable at this, but she doesn't ask. "I….I suppose I can leave you….He probably can hear whatever you're going to say so just….just don't upset him."

Mycroft doesn't respond, and I know it's because he can't promise he won't do anything to upset me. Just his presence is upsetting me. I realize my fists are clenched together and my teeth are grinding, just looking at him.

The nurse leaves without further hesitation, leaving the two of us – or is it, more accurately, the _three _of us? – alone. For a moment the only sounds to be heard are the slight beeping of the heart monitor and the dull roar of conversation outside the room.

_Just say it. Say I'm a horrible brother. Say no one would miss me if I were gone. Just say it. I'm going to die anyway._ I wait for a long while for Mycroft to speak, and eventually, he does. But it's not to say what I thought – or what I'd hoped.

"I don't hate you, you know," he says slowly, his voice quiet. "And I don't blame you."

_Blame me? You've been blaming me since we could talk! You will always blame me, and I will always, always, always –_

"I don't blame you, Sherlock, if you want to leave," Mycroft continues flatly. "I don't think I would stay….you know what happened to John. You know what life holds for you if you wake up. I wouldn't blame you."

I blink slowly, watching him with skeptical eyes. He's _giving me permission _– no, _sympathizing _with me. I want to scream at him that I don't need his sympathy, or his woes, or his apologies or permission or whatever bullshit he has for me.

"I know you dislike me. I know you always have," Mycroft finishes heavily. "But I don't dislike you. Just as I don't blame you because you do…..you probably dislike yourself more than I ever could."

His final words partially stun me, but I mentally shake it off, uncurling my fists as he slowly walks out of the room.

_I don't blame you if you want to leave._

Then why, why, _why am I forced to stay?_

~0~

_I didn't always hate him._

_There was a time when we were young that we were inseparable. _

_But then Mycroft did something I could never forgive him for._

_He grew up._

_When we were young – I was only a few months old – Mycroft would tell me fascinating stories. At first they were ones from books, but soon he found those to be boring, and frankly, so did I. So he started making them up. He used to have a vivid imagination, if you'd ever believe, and could make up stories about pirates and princes and knights. Each one made me laugh and sit, awestruck, in his lap as he sat on the floor of the nursery, legs crossed and round face alight._

"_They're not just stories, you know, Sherlock?" He told me once after finishing a harrowing tale of a daring knight on a mission to find his father – who turned out to be a god (I was delighted by this plot twist at the time)._

_I wasn't much of a talker at that age, but my face must've looked quizzical, because Mycroft broke into a huge grin._

"_You can be anything you want to, just like those in the stories. Maybe one day you'll be a scientist." He poked me gently in one of my ribs, and I smiled a wide, toothless smile. "Or an astronaut. Or even – if you're lucky – a pirate!"_

_We shared many laughs in that nursery. A nursery that would soon become a sixteen-year-old boy's bedroom._

_And soon his best friend would turn into his biggest enemy._

_Mycroft's old tale of 'you can do anything!' soon became a tale of 'why do you do that?' I still had a miniscule amount of respect for Mycroft that I did not have for my parents, but that was lost as quickly as evaporating fog._

"_Sherlock."_

_It started with a name. A name he had once told me was 'unique and special,' but now only held every tone of anger and disdain and displeasure possible._

_I looked up at my closed door, contemplating answering or not. I was in the middle of an experiment – one that involved several dead frogs I had collected from the backyard. My room was now my laboratory, overflowing with test slides and glass vials and a numerous amount of dead things. Dead things Mycroft seemed insistent on confiscating from me._

_In the end I decided to abandon my careful dissection of a particular female frog and go out to see what he wanted. The university bound Mycroft stood in the living room, and he faced me as soon as he heard me coming._

"_What were you doing?" he asked at once._

"_The usual," I responded simply, shrugging._

"_Does 'the usual' involve another form of dead animal being kept in your room?"_

_I frowned, clenching my fists. "That's none of your business."_

"_Yes, well, it's mum and dad's business. I don't really think they appreciate dead things festering in your room."_

_I understood, right then, at that moment, that the Mycroft I adored growing up was gone._

"_You told them again, didn't you?" I asked hotly, and it was Mycroft's turn to frown._

"_I had every right to," he said dismissively._

"_You bloody well did not!"_

"_If it involves you doing some sort of ungodly experiment-"_

"_They are not 'ungodly experiments!'" I was slowly getting angry, my jaw clenched and teeth gritted._

"_Aren't they? Three weeks ago you found a rabbit in the backyard that had been dead for a while. You brought it in and started experimenting on it to find out how it died."_

"_Mum and Dad had never been so angry, and all because you told them! I wasn't hurting anybody – and since I can't find out how _humans_ die –"_

"_Are you hearing yourself? What you do, Sherlock it's not….it's not right! Just last week you were testing how different chemicals reacted on the human body – by testing it on yourself!"_

"_It was only iodine and peroxide," I huffed._

"_I'm sure that yellow-green chemical wasn't just 'iodine and peroxide.'" Mycroft rolled his eyes exasperatedly. _

"_Yeah, well, look what you do to yourself!" Quickly I examined him, my brain already making deductions. "Did you get new shoes recently?"_

"_New shoe-" Mycroft stopped himself, and his gaze became suddenly icy. "Sherlock. _Don't_ do this again."_

"_They are new, aren't they? All shiny and expensive and brand new. And you have a new watch. That's definitely not something you can afford, seeing as you were just recently fired from your new job – but Mum and Dad don't know yet, do they?"_

"_And if you tell them, Sherlock –"_

"_But then how did you get the money for all of this?" I cut across him, my voice growing louder with each deduction. "Oh. That's right. By snitching on me! Oh, yes, it's so obvious now, why you keep doing this. Because Mummy and Daddy reward you with wonderful gifts worth more pounds than the clothes on your –"_

"_Stop this, right now, Sherlock." Mycroft's words cut straight across me dangerously._

"_Why? Do you not like my experimenting and deducing and finding things out about you that you don't even know? I'm sorry that's so foreign to you. That's rich coming from a man who's in a love affair with the food he insists on pounding down every chance he –"_

"_At least I actually eat! You're just a walking skeleton, aren't you? An arse named, horse-faced, walking skeleton who thinks he's so much better than anyone in the room!"_

"_At least I can contain myself from diving into any sort of cake or –"_

"_At least I don't keep dead things in my room!"_

"_At least I don't sleep with them like you sleep with your umbrella!"_

_The insults just got progressively worse, with each of us spitting out remark after remark about how horrible the other was._

"_You think you're so great," I spat, waving my hands in mock appreciation. "Mycroft Holmes. Mycroft Bloody Holmes. 'One day I'll practically be the British government, which is good because I'm too dull for much else!'"_

"I'm_ dull?" Mycroft retaliated heatedly. "What about you? Sherlock With the Brain of a Scientist and the Heart of a Machine Holmes! Who wants to be a bloody detective, because apparently being a pirate was far too ambitious for a man with a brain that size!"_

"_When will you get it right? _Consulting_ detective!"_

"_See, this is why you don't have any friends! Always correcting people like you're a fucking god! At least I _have_ friends!"_

_It's a low blow, even for Mycroft. A blow that would've wounded me had I been able to feel it._

_Or maybe I could feel it, because I, for once, had nothing to say back. I was furious, he was furious, and there was an unspoken agreement in the air between us that our 'brotherly bond' had disappeared. That those tales he once told me meant nothing, that the person who once told me nothing I did was wrong was forever gone._

_And I note that when I was younger, and able to believe all of that, I would've cared. But now, I don't have a feeling in the world._

_~0~_

_Always correcting people like you're a fucking god._

Boring. Dying is boring.

I always thought I wanted to be that 'fucking god' Mycroft had called me. Now, I'm grateful for my mortality. Because so far I have not convinced myself that I want to continue to live.

_If John were alive, he'd know what to say. He always knew what to say. He would say just the right thing that would make me want to stay alive._

Oh. John. _John._

A very, very real pain racks my chest, and I hunch over a little, immediately looking up at the hospital bed. That Sherlock Holmes barely twitches, but I am certain this pain is shaking me right now.

_Maybe it's not physical pain you're feeling._

I gasp without sound, the pain in my chest strong enough to close off my throat. But still, the heart inside the body of Sherlock still continues to beat, at a slow, steady state.

But why? This, what I am feeling now, would be strong enough to kill me. Why isn't it? _Why, why, why?_

_Maybe because you're realizing you loved him too._

~0~

_I never told John I loved him back. I refused to feel it. I refused to believe he actually loved me. Because no one loves me. Mycroft doesn't. My parents do not._

_Clearly, John was so accustomed to 'love' he felt free to admit it. I didn't think much of it._

_Looking back on it, I realize John knew what he was doing, and he knew what I was doing. But neither of us stopped. We didn't tell each other anything. John didn't say he was serious when he said he loved me. I never said I never would love him back._

_But we both knew. We always knew, deep down._

_And even though he knew, John was still the one who showed the affection. It started small. Insignificant, even. Just light touches and taking my hand. I did nothing to stop it. I should have._

_Soon it was embraces. Sharing the couch with our legs entangled. Falling asleep on my lap. And still I did nothing._

_And then it was kissing. Light kisses, at first, not on the mouth, but on cheeks, necks, foreheads, hands….all delivered by John. When John had first planted a small, sporadic kiss on my chin, he had not looked embarrassed. Or unsure. He knew what he was doing. And I wished he wouldn't. I wish I had the power within me to stop it. But I still did nothing._

_And because I did not stop it, it led to something I was not prepared for. It led to a kiss – a real, passionate kiss. Mouth to mouth contact. And more than that. Teeth, tongues, mouths – all in one. John definitely knew what he was doing. John definitely wanted to prove something. _

_I never told him I loved him. He was trying to prove to me that he did._

_~0~_

Once. Just this once, I want to sleep.

But I suppose when your whole body is already shut down, it's difficult to sleep.

So instead I watch. I observe, as I always do. I try to make deductions about the nurses that come through to check on me. But for once, the deductions do not come easily. I can see them, but I cannot deduce anything about them.

This is almost worse than the dying. This _is _worse than the dying. My brain, my mind, is all I have. And now that is failing me.

Greg Lestrade comes by after two weeks of watching and attempting to observe. The doctors finally seem to think it'd do me some sort of good to hear friends. Hear them. That's all I can do.

"Quite a mess you've gotten yourself into, Sherlock," is the first thing Lestrade says as the door of the room closes.

Unlike when Mycroft visited, I do not feel upset about this visitation. I have nothing against Lestrade. I am actually, deep down, glad to see him. I am limp as I rest against the wall, examining him, but seeing nothing.

"Haven't seen you in such a spot since you….you overdosed," Lestrade continues, narrowing his eyes. "You've changed since then, you know that? You've changed a lot. And I won't pretend to deny the fact that you didn't change yourself."

_No. I won't either. Because John did. _Another horrible grip of pain seizes me, and I try to fight it back. _This is nothing. John is dead, and there is nothing you can do._

"Look, I know you know John's dead. You're smart, even in this….this state. But don't think that you owe it to him to die, too. It will never be the same for you, if you wake up, but there will always be a case for Sherlock Holmes to solve."

Of course, Lestrade would be the one to pull this. But oddly, hearing him mention 'solving cases' is the only thing that eases the pain still in my chest.

_You're a detective, Sherlock. You still have that, Sherlock._

_But what good is that, when you don't have someone to share it with anymore? _An evil voice inside of me whispers.

And the pain is back, just as quickly as it ceased.

~0~

_I was at my lowest point when Greg Lestrade brought me back up. Overdosed and crashed in someone's flat. Someone who had come home, screamed, and called the police._

_I was too high to even care much. I was just out of university, and had discovered drugs. They were something, I found, that could do wonders to me. That could do something to me no one else up to that point could. _

_I wasted away for a few years, taking drugs and eventually becoming a sort of street mogul. It didn't matter, really, at the time. All that mattered was selling whatever I had to get my next fix._

_But one of those went too far. Lestrade was the one who was called to aid in the bust, and found a very drugged Sherlock Holmes._

_I should have been arrested, but instead I was taken to the hospital. Maybe Lestrade saw something in me no one else had, because he was there when I woke up after days of darkness._

"_You overdosed," he said the minute my eyes were open._

_My mouth twitched in an almost smirk. "So I'm aware."_

"_This isn't funny," Lestrade snapped, noticing. "You know you could be arrested for this. You could be sent to jail for possession of cocaine and breaking and entering."_

"_Well, clearly I am not, given the fact I'm healthy and fine here." The seriousness of the situation was lost on me, for I was still lightheaded and dizzy and downright ridiculous from the few nights before._

"_No, you're not being charged with anything. Just some community service. Apparently, they seemed to think you were out of your right mind. Insanity plea."_

"_Oh, but I'm not insane." My eyes halfway shut, a full smirk on my face._

"_Oddly, I would beg to differ. Only an insane person would take that much cocaine and overdose on it."_

_My eyes open fully again, and, not for the first time, I started to observe Lestrade's features, his well-practiced hands, and stress-lined face._

"_I'm not unintelligent," I informed him, smirk faded. "Would you like to know why?"_

_Lestrade's eyes narrowed suspiciously, his arms crossed over his chest._

"_You haven't been wearing your wedding ring lately," I told him, almost lazily. "But you do own one; the mark is there, on your left ring finger. I would deduce that you and the wife have been having some problems, but you, being a rather trusting, loyal man, are unwilling to accept that you two are falling out. Or that she's been cheating on you – it's not hard to decipher. So you decided to just go a few days – it's only been a few, based on the prominence of the mark on your finger – to go without wearing your ring. But by the way you keep rubbing your hands together, it makes you uncomfortable, and you'll probably go back to wearing it and keep giving your wife a chance – but somehow I think you know she's not going to change."_

_Lestrade blinked, his arms dropping loosely to his sides, and he looked quite amazed. "How did you know all of that?"_

"_I just observed," I told him simply. "It's what I do. Consulting detective. People come to me with cases – consultations. I observe and solve….or at least I did for a while."_

"_So….so can you do that with everybody?" Lestrade asked, still a bit dumbstruck._

"_Usually. Probably," I corrected myself._

_Lestrade looked back at the hospital room door, and then back at me, suddenly looking a little eager, but still unsure. "Can you – how you say – deduce anything about your nurse?"_

_I thought back to what I had remembered seeing about her. Brunette hair, blue eyes, hoarse voice, thin hands…_

"_She sings," I informed Lestrade. "Well, sort of. She's not very good. She still has a dream of being involved in show business, but her family didn't approve, so she went to nursing school instead. Still, that doesn't stop her from –"_

"_Wait, hold on. You got all of that from a single _look _at her?" Lestrade interrupted, and I rolled my eyes before nodding. "You've never met her before, and you knew all of that?"_

"_I observe, and then I deduce. It's what I do," I said again, my eyes closing again._

"_I wish I could say that's remarkable, but frankly….I just haven't seen anyone do it before. It's a bit odd…but I'd bet anything it makes you a fine detective –"_

"_Consulting detective…I invented the job."_

"_Right, that….I'm sure we'll be keeping in touch, Sherlock."_

_It was against his better judgment that he consulted me with new cases. And for once in my life, I found something I cared about. I didn't need the drugs anymore. Just the cases. The crimes. The thrill._

_It was, maybe, against my better judgment to allow John Watson to enter the picture._

~0~

I wonder if I just stopped thinking, just turned off my mind, the rest of my body would follow.

But still, Sherlock Holmes continues to live.

He's fighting for something, and I don't know what it is.

Or maybe I do. But I just can't admit it yet.

~0~

"_This is where these bodies are kept?"_

_Lestrade walked with me down the halls of St. Bart's, towards the morgue. The atmosphere doesn't affect me, but then again, why should it? It's been nearly three years since overdosing, and in that time span I've seen a lot worse to be affected by a hospital for the dead._

"_Yes. Molly Hooper, the one I mentioned earlier, usually is the one down here. She can get us in to see basically any dead man we want to see," Lestrade answered, pushing open one of the doors and walking into the white, nearly empty room. While Lestrade walked ahead, I slowed to examine the multiple tables of covered bodies. Vaguely I wondered how each of them died. Just as I would wonder when I was sixteen and dissecting frogs._

"_Sherlock."_

_I looked up, my hands knotted behind my back, and noticed Lestrade was talking to a rather frail looking woman, her reddish brown hair tied back and her skin fair._

"_You must be Molly," I said, coming up to her._

"_Y-Yes. And you must be Sherlock Holmes," Molly said, her voice slightly uncertain._

"_You can get us to see the body of Violet Mercer?" I asked her at once, without bothering any further with introductions and small talk._

"_Oh. Yes. Is that who you're here for?" Molly looked over at Lestrade, who nodded._

"_Sherlock just wants to examine her again. I wrote him off a permission with the staff," Lestrade informed her. "You still keeping her?"_

"_They said something about wanting an autopsy done," Molly said, and, unable to help myself, I snorted derisively._

"_They won't find anything in an autopsy; she wasn't poisoned like it seems," I said, as Molly jumped a little and Lestrade sighed heavily. _

"_The investigators seemed quite certain," Molly said, leading us over to one of the covered tables._

"_What do they know," I stated, rolling my eyes. "This her?"_

_Molly nodded, removing the covering and carefully unzipping the body bag Violet Mercer was kept in. The dead woman was extraordinarily pale, with distinct discoloring of her open skin. _

"_Lestrade, could I borrow your hands?" I asked suddenly, examining the woman's neck carefully._

"_What in the bloody -?"_

"_My hands are way too big for the marks," I interrupted him, as if it were obvious. "I just need something to compare them too. There are strangle marks on her neck – so obviously bruised."_

"_So you're suggesting you just put my hands to her neck as a 'comparison?'"_

"_Do you want the case solved or not?"_

"_I can do it," Molly spoke up, and when I looked at her I realized her cheeks were flushed. "I touch bodies all the time….I know my hands are a little small, but…."_

_She shrugged, and I narrowed my eyes at her, trying to figure her out. Trying to understand why she was so willing to do what I asked. No one else did. Not usually. Lestrade only did after nearly ten minutes of bickering back and forth._

_But here was someone who had only known me for a measly five minutes and she….trusted me? Was that the word?_

_No, Sherlock, it wasn't trust. It's something you're still not willing to admit._

_Because of Molly's help, the case of Violet Mercer's death was solved within a two day time span. But I still couldn't understand something._

_Why did Molly seem so willing to care?_

~0~

There is surgery to be done to eliminate the fluid in my lungs, and the many punctures my internal organs have suffered from the car crash. I find that I have to follow my body into surgery, and am forced to watch as the doctors carefully operate.

"You can easily go now," I find myself whispering, even though only I can hear. "What good is life without –"

My voice falters and fails. For a moment I stand in silence over my body, unblinking, and, for once, unthinking.

"What are you waiting for?" I say, my hands shaking. "There's nothing keeping you here. Nothing."

But in some way, there is. There is something keeping me alive. And it's the same thing that will kill me.

~0~

_No one is supposed to love me, or care about me. That's why Molly surprised me. That's why John shocked me. Why even Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade astonished me. Because they all cared. And I didn't understand why._

_None more so than John, it seemed._

_And yes, I did care for him. I cared for him in a different way than I eventually grew to care for Molly and Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade._

_But the love John showed for me was still unbelievable._

_And John would never know._

_But he still tried. He still kissed me, still held me, still showed little signs of affection that I could never reciprocate. He tried and tired, up until the day he died, to show me that he did, truly, love me._

"_Why is it so hard for you?" he asked me once, as we sat, facing each other, on the couch, no more than a few centimeters apart. "What are you afraid -?"  
_

"_I'm not afraid of anything," I told him at once._

"_Then why, _why Sherlock, _won't you believe me?" John's hand slowly reached up and gently touched my cheek, and I wanted more than anything for him to stop._

"_Why won't I believe you? Because you do things like this – clichéd, lovesick things – and I can't believe that. No one is supposed to love me."_

"_What does that even mean, Sherlock? You've told me that, but I don't understand what you're trying to say."_

"_I'm not someone who can be loved, John."_

"_But _I _love _you._" _

_There it was again. The dreaded three words. I turned my face away from him, clenching my fists to keep my hands from shaking._

"_You don't," I said, shaking my head forcefully. "You don't, John, and you know you don't."_

_John finally took his hand from my face, and when he spoke again I could almost hear the frown in his voice. "I don't know that. And when I think about it, I don't think you know much yourself… Why can't you accept that people in this world care about you? That people in this world might just love you? What are you afraid of, Sherlock?"_

"_I'm not afraid!" I repeated, turning back to him. "I have seen too much to be afraid of something as petty and pitiful as 'love.'"_

"_You say that, Sherlock, but you are afraid of something! You're a human, Sherlock. All humans, at some point, are afraid of love….."_

_I blinked, my heart beating painfully against my chest, a small, angry fire burning in the pit of my stomach. "I am not afraid of love. You know what I am afraid of? I am afraid of the things that come from it. People I love tend to leave, or get hurt. I have seen people die and kill for love – or in spite of it. I am not afraid of love, John. I just have grown to deny it, so no one will be hurt from it. So no one will leave me because of it. My life is better without _love._"_

_John looked at me for a long time, unblinkingly, before he slowly stood up from the couch. I did not look at him, instead staring ahead at the place where he had been._

"_I think your heart just grew three sizes, Sherlock, because that's the most I've ever heard you say," he whispered. "And I think, if you look deep inside yourself, you can feel what you say you're denying."_

"_I'm not denying anything. I'm just staying away," I told him, still not looking at him._

"_I don't think there's much of a difference."_

~0~

I now stand over my own body, looking down at the scarred face of a broken man. I have heard mixed messages over the past few weeks. Some are telling me to stay. And some are telling me it's okay if I leave.

I know it's okay if I leave. I know that. I've been trying to leave since I saw John Watson in the back of that cab.

What is he waiting for?

"You can leave," I say again, my eyes fixed on my own closed eyes. "In fact, I want you to leave. What are you waiting for? John's dead. There's nothing left. You couldn't save him, so what makes you think you can save yourself?"

There's a familiar pain rushing through my body at the thought of John, but my body is still. Breathing. Living.

"You are waiting. And I know what for. But it's not going to happen." It feels strange, to be having a conversation with yourself, but I can think of no other option. There is no other solution that will get me out of the extraordinary pain I am feeling.

"You're waiting for him," I say quietly, my voice shaking. "You're waiting for John. Well. Guess what? He's dead. He can never come to you. If you're waiting for a holy angel to grace you and tell you what to do, you'll be here for awhile. Because there are no such things as angels. And even if there were, he wouldn't be one."

I glance back at the closed door of the room. "No one can save you if you try hard enough to leave. Which you will not do. When will you choose to leave? What are you waiting for? Are you waiting for some sort of revelation, an epiphany, or some sort of –"

I stop myself, blinking, a hundred things hitting me at once. The heart monitor beside my bed speeds up a little, but I can barely hear it.

The one thing keeping me alive is the one thing that will kill me.

"Oh. Oh, where do we go from here?" I turn back around, hysteria rising in my unheard voice. "Where, oh, where, do we pick up from here? You want me to admit it, don't you? The one man who is keeping you alive right now is the one man who will kill you. The one man, the only man, the only _person_ who ever loved you. Is that what you're waiting for? Three simple words, and you can leave?"

My throat is burning with the effort to control myself from gasping and sobbing. I can't do that to myself. Alive or not, I cannot. I will not.

"Then you're going to be here awhile, aren't you?" I say hoarsely. "Because I'm not saying it. I will never say it. _Because no one loves me._ Is it so hard to leave with that concept in your mind?"

_Yes, because you know he did love you. And you know that –_

"I have gone my entire life without anyone, _anyone, _caring for me!" If my voice were audible, it would now be a shout. "I abandoned that long ago. I abandoned _love _long ago! It is a dangerous, dangerous game, and if this isn't proving it…."

_People have died and killed for love – or in spite of it. And now, you will join them._

"I didn't love him! I can't love him! There is nothing that….this…" I have lost control of myself, the tears already forming in my eyes and the painful sobs forcing their way out to the open. I can't continue on like this. John has done this to me. I hate him for it. _I hate him I hate him I hate him._

"_I loved John Watson,"_ I say finally, the pain in my chest exploding and tears falling down my frozen face. "Is that what you wanted? I admit it. I never told him. I should have. _I loved him. _I still love him. He is the only person in this world I will ever love."

Just at these words, the body of Sherlock begins to shake. Slowly, I can feel the pain from the injuries and the pain from the loss flooding into me, making my vision blur. The machines surrounding me begin to sound off alerts, but I know that no matter who comes to save me, it will be a pointless act.

"I never wanted to admit that a man like me, Sherlock Holmes, could love someone. Sherlock With the Brain of a Scientist and Heart of a Machine Holmes. Friendless, drug addicted, arrogant Sherlock Holmes. No one could love me…._but I could love them."_ The words are not stopping, just as the dying and pain are not ceasing. The doctors are coming. They will try, but they will fail. I've made my peace, and I'm leaving them behind.

There is nothing left.

"_This is my note,"_ I whisper, my vision almost completely faded.

With a shuddering gasp of breath, the Sherlock Holmes in the hospital bed opens his eyes, for the first time in four weeks. For a long second, it's as if he can see his ghost lingering there before him. And for a long second more, the mind and the heart connect.

And then there is complete darkness.

_You left. So I came._


End file.
